Why is this game so male-dominated?

I got it. We can do the whole 'divide and conquer' thingamajig where we argue how people who are like each of us individually are the best and/or better than people who are different.

Then we can use this bias to wield control and win special privileges based on our betterness.

It's no fun though if we don't exclude those who are different.

Everyone game?

Each individual for themselves! That is until the weaker ones need to include the mouse in their pockets for the whole strength in numbers play.

See. Those of us who truly are better don't have any problem with esteeming others to be better than ourselves.

You only chase something you don't already have.

Owning everything in the world, I have no need to travel.

Get it?

And after all, the 20% of competitive women should beat the 80% of the male majority (partly factual, partly fictional)...

Apparently, yu're the only crap that got stirred up.

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You clearly were when you decided to make this post. You are only digging a hole...and you are standing in it...you should quit now, before you bury yourself in more crap...

The point is a general group characteristic, while it will predict something better than no general group characteristic at all... it will still be wrong too often.

If the only information you knew about two people was that one was Irish and the other was some "non-drinking nationality," and if you had to guess who was the heavy drinker, then Irish would be a better guess. Yet if there were high stakes behind this guess, you'd probably be nervous -- you might have a feeling you will be right, but know you could very well be wrong as well. Certainly you'd be way more confident if you knew a lot more information about the two people. In fact with enough information it might become obvious to you that the Irish man is not the drinker based on the specific characteristics you learned and observed from the two people.

So the fact that someone is Irish might in the long run be better information than no information at all, that still doesn't imply that it's, in itself, especially useful. Even if in this experiment there was say a 55% chance of it being the Irish guy and a 45% chance of it being the other guy, the fact that 45% of the time you'd be wrong is significant.

You're standing on your head in it.

Come on, you can do better than that. I am disappointed. I thought you were clever...

Please stop the flame wars, guys.

this is bs now,  untracked

Hi, I'm new here.  And a woman too, lol.

Here's what I don't get--  why does it even MATTER that chess is male-dominated?  Some activities and interests are female-dominated (let's use knitting as an example) and I've never seen any concern about how we can encourage more men to take it up. 

To me, girls and women who are interested in chess will gravitate toward chess regardless of whether they're in the minority of players.  I was one of the only girls in my high school chess club, and that certainly never bothered me.  In college, I went on to study computer science and quickly realized I was one of the only girls in most of those classes---  do you think I suddenly wanted to change my major from something I loved, just because it wasn't perfectly balanced between males and females?

I think in a strange way, this push to get girls involved in chess is somewhat counterproductive, because it sort of highlights their "minority" status in the sport. 

Most of the macho-males here would be peeing their pants if they had to sit down to play vs Judit Polgar.

It doesn't matter one bit that chess is male-dominated (or engineering or programming). Topics that don't have to do with specific games on these forums are generally not worth reading.

I like your knitting analogy. I once thought about knitting a shawl with someone's name on it and giving it to them just to freak them out. They had to be a stranger of course so the whole "why did this man knit a shawl with my name on it" effect to work.

I didn't follow through with it but I once told a few people I had knitted a shawl with their name on it. They didn't quite know how to take it and I got everything from, "Thanks! That was so thoughtful of you" to, "Cool! Can you knit one for someone else in my family too?" 

If you've never walked up to a random stranger in public and confided in them that you have knitted a shawl with their name on it, I highly recommend you get to it at once (if not sooner.)

If they freak out, just tell them,  "Don't fight it. Just close your eyes and accept it. I have knitted a shawl with YOUR name on it." 

There's something exhilirating about breaking through the preconceived ideas about what is possible that's almost like magic if only for that moment.

Just make sure to wear some running shoes before you do it. Don't ask now, but you'll thank me later.

I think they wouldn't pee their pants, they would realize just how insignificant they are...

I personally could use a good spanking for a high level female chess player....

lol this is so off-topic

Go up to too many strangers saying that, and you might end up in the funny farm knitting shawls with peoples names on em.  )

Oh Conflag. You always know just what to say. One can only hope, but it hasn't worked yet.

Must mean I have some more knitting to do. Peace!

I think you may just be onto something with that one. It's so crazy it just might work! 

This one's for Peli:

Humina, humina, humina! 

Or maybe I just knit the name, "Beautiful" and say, "When I saw you, I knew who this was made for. Here you go."

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